4 Ways Comedy Improv Can Better Your Sales Team

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David Sill is Senior Vice President of Sales at DiscoverOrg, a leading global sales and marketing intelligence tool used by over 2,300 of the world’s fastest growing companies to accelerate growth. The company has been named to the Inc. 5000 list an impressive six straight years. DiscoverOrg’s solutions provide a constant stream of accurate and actionable company, contact, and buying intelligence that can be used to find, connect with, and sell to target buyers more effectively.

Comedy improv has a lot to offer sales professionals and sales leaders due to its relevancy as both a predictor of and plan toward success. Here are four key—and perhaps surprising—ways it can be leveraged for sales teams, writes, David Sill, Senior Vice President of Sales, DiscoverOrg

There are many schools of thought about how to best train salespeople. Some companies rely on well-known, highly reputable corporate sales training programs, often paying an expert a sizable fee to impart their knowledge to the sales, customer success and marketing teams. Other companies take an unstructured approach, allowing sales teams to use instincts and natural talent to organically grow a team and bring products to market, sharing tribal knowledge along the way. I believe that no one approach fits every team. There are some unconventional approaches that can be hugely beneficial. Improv comedy is one method that never fails to teach—or surprise.

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Improv is a form of comedy that revels in off-the-cuff honesty and in-the-moment decision making. It’s the polar opposite of a stale, pre-rehearsed performance—it’s free-flowing, quirky and unconventional, and delivers imagination and laughter. It’s also rich ground for study to aspiring and practicing sales professionals. Here are four ways in which leveraging improvisational comedy can make you a more dynamic, positive, self-reliant and well-rounded sales professional and sales leader.

1. Improv as an indicator of the right hire

Anyone can get dressed up and look great on Saturday night, but I need to know what you look like on Sunday morning. In other words, when hiring sales talent, you shouldn't trust the interview, which is a largely predictable event that most candidates are ready for, practiced at, and polished during. The same can be said for their past work history, which invites embellishment and casts everything in the best possible light. Impromptu role-playing, on the other hand, levels the playing field and forces every candidate to deal with the moment. It's at that point you as hiring manager get the most honest evidence. Do the candidates hold themselves with poise and confidence, even in the face of the unknown? Or do they fall apart, a bundle of sweat and nerves and stuttering responses? After two decades of hiring sales talent, I can say that if I were forced to rely on only one thing, I would choose roleplay performance over any other measure to make a hiring decision.

2. Improv pushes you out of your comfort zone

I took a comedy improv class as a liberal arts elective as an undergraduate, and the first thing that becomes very obvious to everyone in the room is that there's nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. With improv, you absolutely must get over yourself. You will look ridiculous and stupid in front of others, and you will fail in a very public way from time to time. This is the price of entry into improv, but it's also the bond that unites. When a group of 19 and 20-year-olds realizes this, it becomes an almost instantaneous and magical "circle of trust" in a time of great need (that "why did I pick this class again?" moment). It’s an “I-promise-not-to-judge-if-you-promise-not-to-judge” pact, and once that is established, true development starts to happen. As we all have learned—and reinforced with experience—the comfort zone is where you go to die. If you want to grow, you must leave your comfort zone every single chance you get. Improv, as it turns out, buys you a trusting support group that makes life outside the comfort zone seem safer, easier and better.

3. Improv forces self-confidence

If you sell to the C-suite, you can't hope to succeed if you self-identify as being subordinate to that CEO, CMO, CRO or CIO. You have to believe you have every reason to be in that conversation or meeting, with something worthwhile to offer. In fact, you have to convince yourself that you are the higher-ranking participant in that moment. You are the subject matter expert of your chosen domain. You think about this stuff all the time, unlike the person on the other side of your conversation or conference table. In fact, they aren't thinking about this stuff much, if they are thinking about it at all. But it starts in your head, with your own confidence. The techniques taught in improv buy you that type of confidence.

4. Improv develops flexibility without losing control

Another rule of improv is that you have to go with the moment. You can't stop the action—you have to continue it. "Yes, and...." is how it's described to newbie improv students. It might be that my fellow improv colleague decides to offer up a most challenging, off-the-wall scenario (“I'm a monkey walking into a bar with two rockets, one under each arm, and—” … and, go!). There’s no time for anything other than figuring out how to make it work, right now, in this moment. Turns out this scenario is just about the same as every sales cycle I've ever been part of. Sure, you have your plan of action going in, your best case scenario of how things will unfold. But does it ever go down that way? Almost never. And so the prize in sales will usually be won by the professional who can allow the train to come off the tracks a bit, dance with that uncertainty, then find a way to return to the established agenda, to keep the forward momentum going no matter what wackiness ensues.

Comedy improv is fertile ground for sales, so whether you are a quota-carrying account exec or a manager, give improv a look. Go to a show. Take your team with you. Start your own improv sessions as sales training. Improv is a master class, and with additional practice, it can serve as a catalyst for raising your game.